paul smith's Snaps & Bytes e-home
June 2003: Paul Smith - Happy Days
If you joined me last month, you’d have read a depressing column in which I bemoaned my lot as an unemployed I.T. guru. Shortly after I submitted it I discovered Paul Smith is an anagram of hit a slump, so I guess I should have seen it coming.
This month I’m a far chirpier chappy, having landed my first professional web design job. I met a man while out walking in the woods (steady now) and got chatting about the art that’s dotted about in this particular corner of the Chiltern Hills. I mentioned I was doing a personal page on the sculptures and his ears visibly pricked up. It turned out he helps run the Chiltern Sculpture Trust (I know, I had no idea I moved in such cultured circles either) and within days he’d commissioned me to produce a site for them, cataloguing their past, present, temporary and permanent sculptures. You’ll find the digital fruits of my HTML loom at www.ChilternSculptureTrail.co.uk.
Now I can afford to buy food again, I’ve the strength to turn my attention to the world of PC components. My spies tell me that Maxtor 30Gb 7.2krpm ATA-133 drives are changing hands for around £32, with four-times-larger 120Gb versions only twice the price. Speaking as someone who filled his 40Gb Samsung up in 4 months, I’d say the bigger drive is the one to look at. Speaking of bigger things, I’ve spent this week accepting every exclusive opportunity sent to me by e-mail, in a Dave Gorman style. I now have a sparkling clean septic tank as well as mains sewerage, eight university diplomas and a Russian bride called Olga, who fights with Svetlana, my other Russian bride. I’ve also got several part-time jobs that’ll make me a million working from home, a metric tonne of Viagra in the back bedroom, over a billion dollars worth of life insurance and a nine-foot long cock. Lucky me.
Wish list: I’d like to see a Big Brother (as in the telly series, not Orwell’s powerful diatribe on the dehumanising nature of technocratic society. Damn, this culture thing is catching) add-on for the Sims. I’d like Nintendo to address their release schedule and get some software out that’ll keep GameCube on shops shelves, in the sense that you’ll want to stock it, rather than it not selling. Why can’t there be a proper daytime television programme about computers, where silver surfers can learn not to delete their system files because they look untidy and bored housewives can be seduced by the promise of Internet grocery shopping? I want Sony to produce a new iMac style integrated LCD monitor/PC, a real carbon-fibre GameBoy SP, and Spamers shot please.
Now, for a man whose name is an anagram of a hump slit (now I know why people always call me a- leave it) that’s not too much to ask, is it?
Paul Smith still seeks employment Nirvana. Please e-mail him at info@snapsandbytes.co.uk with your offers.
481 joyous words Dale. Be lucky.